


Normalcy Is A Trainwreck Anyways

by xyliane



Category: Hunter X Hunter
Genre: Fluff, Long-Distance Relationship, M/M, Mutual Pining, Phone Calls
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-25
Updated: 2016-06-25
Packaged: 2018-07-18 05:57:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,974
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7302148
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/xyliane/pseuds/xyliane
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Killua goes on a date. Spoilers: It's not with Gon. Double spoilers: Gon wants to know everything.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Normalcy Is A Trainwreck Anyways

Killua comes back to the small hotel room to find it empty of any Zoldyck presence save for a note scrawled in Alluka’s handwriting on the tiny desk. His sisters are gone until tomorrow—something about a calligrapher in the next town over who’s resurrected a dead language—so he’s got the room to himself. Or well, him and his incessantly ringing cell phone. It’s been ringing for the last ten minutes, and Killua should really shove down the butterflies in his stomach and pick the damn thing up.

He takes a shower instead. It doesn’t stop the phone from ringing and ringing and _ringing_ , so there’s nothing Killua can do once he’s dressed but flop backwards onto his bed, sigh heavily, and answer the phone.

The first thing Gon says when Killua picks up is, “So how did it go?”

“The date?” he asks, knowing that’s exactly what Gon wants to know about. His best friend’s in the middle of a job for Bisky, hopping around the Azian continent searching for a Hunter known for homemade gem forgeries and “forgetting” to pay taxes, and he wants to know about Killua’s dating life of all things. Killua can only blame himself, really, for telling Gon about it in the first place.

“ _Yes_ the date!” Gon’s voice is as excited as though Killua is passing his Hunter exam again. Which he’s not, dammit, it is just a date.

With a boy.

A boy who is _not_ his best friend.

It had actually been a lot of fun? What had started as a cup of coffee with an interesting and bizarrely nice stranger had morphed into hanging out with _Shultz_ , a redheaded student a year or two older than Killua whose obsession with structural engineering was only matched by his enthusiasm for mixed-martial artist matches. While Alluka’s been busy finishing her most recent exams for linguist archaeologists, Killua pulled some strings to get him and Shultz tickets to the local fighting competition (a mix of nen and non-nen users, not that anyone else seemed to notice). Killua didn’t even realize he was on a date until Shultz asked what exactly they were doing. A date-date, not just a hanging out-date or a just-friends date. And astonishingly, Killua’s entirely fine with this development.

A _date_. Like a normal teenager. Killua can’t help but grin at the thought. How _weird_.

But really, it was just a date. Which makes Gon’s insistence on Killua not sparing him any details all the more ridiculous. “Killuaaaaaa _aaaa_ ,” Gon says, dragging his name out until it’s just a high-pitched whine.

“ _What_ , Gon? I already told you what happened.” Gon’d been messaging Killua during the thing to the point that Killua’d had to put his phone on silent, since the idiot had been more interested in the _date_ than the fights. Not that the fights were all that good to Killua’s eyes—Gon could have taken any of the winners with his wrists tied to his ankles, and even _Leorio_ probably wouldn’t have had to break a sweat—but Shultz seemed to enjoy it, and Killua liked that.

“You didn’t tell me what he’s like, though.”

Shultz is nice, but he’s not… It isn’t the sort of thing Killua thinks is going to work out. Not just that Killua’s got a half-dozen hits on his name alone, at least last he checked, or that he’ll be gone by the end of next week at the latest. He _likes_ Shultz, likes him enough to want to stay in touch with him later. But Shultz is…

“He’s normal,” Killua says. “Not _completely_ normal—that’d be completely boring. But he’s not us.”

“There’s nobody like us, Killua,” Gon says. After a brief pause, he adds, “There’s no one like you.”

“Well, duh.” It’s a good thing Gon’s on the other end of a phone, halfway around the world, because he’d find the blushing on Killua’s face to be hilarious.

“Look, you know it went fine,” Killua grumbles. “He asked if I wanted to go on one more date before Alluka and I have to leave. I think we might go to the amusement park; Shultz said it’s got a few rides designed by a Thrill Hunter and he’s never convinced anyone else to go with him. Plus this time, Alluka can come with—she’s never been on a roller coaster, and there’s one supposed to break the sound barrier!”

Gon makes an affirmative noise, still endlessly and almost obnoxiously chipper. “That’s good, Killua. But if you make Shultz throw up, though, that’s a failure at dating.”

“ _You_ haven’t been on a date in years!” Not that Killua knows of, anyways. And Gon would tell him, he’s sure. Probably.

Killua can hear Gon grinning, even through the phone. “And _I_ have never made my dates throw up. So that would make me a winner.”

“You can’t win at dating,” Killua says.

“You just say that because I’m already beating you. You know, if you need help, I have ideas—”

The day Killua takes dating advice from Gon will be the day he gives up chocorobos, no matter how good of a reputation Gon might have. “That won’t happen in a hundred years.”

“Then I’ll wait a hundred and one!”

Killua laughs despite himself. Typical Gon logic, through and through. In the rare moments he lets himself think about it, Killua knows he loves his best friend—just like he loves his sisters, but sort of in an entirely different way. It’s normal to miss seeing him every day, to miss his warmth next to him sprawled out on a patch of dirt. He doesn’t need to tell Gon that, though. Gon understands.

(In those even rarer, fleeting moments that he _actually_  thinks about it, Killua knows it runs much deeper than simple friendship. He doesn’t think of Leorio or Kurapika, or Canary, or Ikalgo or Palm, or even his sisters, like he thinks of Gon. Gon’s his first and dearest friend. His first heartbreak. His first…a lot of things, really _._ But he doesn’t want to put a different label on what they have, if there is even something to put a label on, and Killua tells himself he is more than fine with keeping things like that.)

“You still haven’t told me about what you did after you stopped messaging,” Gon says, voice light and teasing. “Come _on_ Killua, tell me! I know you’ll tell Palm.”

If Gon had been in reaching distance, Killua would have shoved a pillow into his face. He has to settle for promising himself _so much revenge_ later. “We just went for milkshakes after the last fights,” he says. He remembers the excitement in Shultz’s eyes, almost forgetting about his strawberry milkshake as he babbled about ring stability when the fighters’ fists could shatter durasteel. He’d used the empty cups and straws to try to explain some of the physics to Killua, stopping only to scribble a note to himself in a tiny notebook full of numbers and sketches. It’s kind of fascinating to watch the utter glee of discovery from the outside, like distant lightning strikes in a forest, even if Killua only understood part of what was being said.

Shultz had kept talking even on the way back to Shultz’s dorm, across town from Killua and Alluka’s hotel, the banter comfortable without being too much. But halfway back, the sky opened up and they had to dash into cover, huddling and laughing as they tried to dry off a little while waiting and waiting and _waiting_ for the rain to stop, Shultz edging closer, a small smile on his face as he carefully laced their hands together. Even now, on the phone with Gon, Killua can still see the tiny flecks of reddish-gold in Shultz’s eyes as he leaned in, as Shultz asked, _Can I_ _…?_

“He kissed me,” Killua blurts out.

It might be his imagination, but there’s a moment of audible silence from the other side of the phone. “That’s great!” Gon says, and the phone connection must be getting worse because his voice sounds strained. “Um. If it was great? Because if it wasn’t, then you shouldn’t do it again. Because you shouldn’t…” He coughs. “Only if it was?”

“I…yeah,” Killua finds himself saying. It’s _objectively_ true: Shultz actually remembers to breathe, for one, and he doesn’t tug at Killua’s hair like he lost his wallet in it. He takes his time, never asking for more than Killua gives, however hesitantly. His hands, on Killua’s face or his shoulders, are long and lean and not covered in scars or callouses, but they hide a quiet strength all the same. Shultz is…well. _Normal_.

It is such a contrast with Gon, who is anything but. And if he kisses like Killua imagines he does (and Killua is usually right about this sort of Gon thing), it’d be like he’s trying to swallow whoever is unlucky enough to grab his attention, all enthusiasm and determination and taking no survivors. It’d be a train wreck of a kiss, and some part of Killua welcomes the inevitable disaster gleefully. If anything, kissing Shultz has only made it worse because he can’t help but wonder _what if.._.?

No need to bring that up now, though. “He’s definitely a better kisser than you,” he hears himself say, a mocking lilt to his voice that he doesn’t actually feel.

It should have been no surprise Gon takes this as a freaking _challenge_. “I’ll just have to practice.”

Something terribly familiar twists in Killua’s stomach. He is really, _really_ glad Gon is on the other side of the world because he’s not sure what he’d do—or what he’d let Gon do to him. But this is just Gon being Gon. It has to be. Right? “You don’t need to practice kissing with people you don’t like to kiss, or else you’re just kissing the wrong person.”

Gon laughs, like he’s not the one making no sense. “Then the only person I can practice with is Killua!”

The twisting feeling stretches up to his throat and squeezes _hard._ “Gon–”

“You’d tell me if I’m doing something wrong. Most people don’t do that.” Killua just about falls out of the bed. Of course it’s all about practice for Gon.

“How many people have you ‘practiced’ with?” he demands. Gon laughs again but doesn’t answer, and they drift into companionable, weird-but-not-bad quiet.

It’s not about how Killua does not think he can handle kissing Gon, because then he’d have to think about how he wants to kiss his _best friend_ , and that’s a road he cannot go down, not now. He has a date with Shultz soon! And that the only thing he thinks about when Shultz kisses him is his best friend…

Gon is the first to break the silence, his voice soft and hesitant. “I like…” Gon is thinking loud enough for Killua to hear, even if he can’t make out the words. If he could just see Gon’s face, that would be a different story, but like this? It’s a wall made of oceans and forests and cities, keeping them separate. Killua realizes he’s holding his breath when Gon finally says, like he’s telling a secret, “I think I’d like kissing you.”

A door smashes open on Gon’s end of the line, utterly shattering the weird-but-not-bad tension. Even through the phone Killua can hear someone shouting Gon’s name. There’s the sound of a scuffle, and Gon yells something Killua can’t make out, breathless and laughing. “Sorry Killua! I have to get back to work,” he says, and sounds like he really is sorry, but also like he’s relieved. Killua understands far too well. “Text me with how it goes!”

“Dumbass,” Killua says as the phone goes silent. _I think I like you too_.

**Author's Note:**

> Pining pining pining with a side of a river in Egypt. Also available on [tumblr](https://xyliane.tumblr.com/post/146470969433/normalcy-is-a-train-wreck-anyways) so please feel free to come and yell with me about h x h


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